Category: Iraq

At least 17 people were killed in attacks across Iraq on Sunday as troops fought to evict Islamist militants from the northern town of Sulaiman Pek, security sources and medics said. Armored vehicles and special police forces with heavy machineguns arrived in Sulaiman Pek to reinforce troops battling there for several days backed by helicopters gunships. "Clashes are continuing today in the town centre," the town’s mayor, Talib Mohammed, told Reuters. "The situation is still unclear. We can’t even look out of the window, as bullets and blasts are not stopping." Militants raised the black flag of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) – a hardline Sunni group also fighting in neighboring Syria – over parts of Sulaiman Pek, 160 km (100 miles) north of Baghdad, on Thursday. Sunni militancy has been on the rise over the past year, especially in the […]

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Iraq has the largest internal displacement since the height of the US war on its hands today as government forces try to wrest control of parts of Anbar Province back from militants, adding yet another source of instability to a country already teetering. Skip to next paragraph According to a Feb. 13 United Nations report , 62,679 families have fled since the fighting began at the end of December – 13,000 of them this week alone. With the UN’s rough estimate of six people per family, that is more than 370,000 people, most of them pouring out of the Anbar cities of Fallujah and Ramadi. According to the report, 85 percent of Fallujah’s population has been displaced. Some are finding shelter in other parts of Anbar, but many are moving on to neighboring provinces, and an estimated 5,000 families have traveled to the relative safety of Iraqi Kurdistan in the […]

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Iraqi officials have begun recruiting thousands of Sunni fighters on the government payroll, supplying weapons to other volunteer tribal fighters and pledging millions of dollars in aid to restive Anbar province as they try to beat back extremist Sunni jihadi militants. The militants are battling for control of mainly Sunni areas west of Baghdad in a key test of the Shiite-led government’s ability to maintain security more than two years after the withdrawal of U.S. troops. But the push to expel the jihadis — members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, until recently al-Qaida’s powerful affiliate in Iraq — is complicated by divisions among the tribes that form the social fabric of the besieged city of Fallujah and other parts of Anbar, raising questions over whether the government needs to make a bigger investment to win over Sunni skeptics. Many in the Sunni […]

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Iraqi officials say simultaneous bomb blasts at a Baghdad market have killed at least five people. A police officer says two bombs, hidden in clothing stalls in the capital’s al-Arabi wholesale market, went off simultaneously on Thursday morning. The officer says the explosions also wounded 15 people. A medical official confirmed the causality figures. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to talk to media. Public places such as cafes, restaurants, mosques and markets are favorite targets for militants in Iraq seeking to undermine the Shiite led-government efforts to maintain security nationwide. Thursdays’ bombings took place as Iraqi security forces and allied Sunni tribal militias are battling al-Qaida-linked militants who have seized significant areas in the country’s west since late December. © 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more […]

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Fifteen soldiers were killed this week guarding an oil pipeline in northern Iraq, the first assault to involve so many casualties amid concerns an al-Qaida insurgency in western Iraq is spreading to vital oil-producing regions. Iraqi security authorities said Tuesday’s attack on the camp in Nineveh province took place the same day that Iraqi security forces captured three al-Qaida suspects as they tried to blow up a pipeline near the northern Kirkuk oilfields, which hold about a third of Iraq’s oil reserves of 431 billion barrels. Twin pipelines that carry Kirkuk’s oil production to Turkey’s Ceyhan terminal on the Mediterranean for export are a frequent target for saboteurs. Hussein al-Shahristani , Iraqi’s deputy prime minister for energy, told reporters in Baghdad Jan. 28 Iraq’s oil industry, the country’s economic lifeline, is increasingly coming under attack because of the civil war in neighboring Syria in […]

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Last updated at 14:00 Anbar Governor Ahmed al-Dulaimi gave the militants until the weekend to surrender Up to 300,000 people have now been displaced by the fighting between Sunni militants and security forces in Iraq’s western province of Anbar, the UN says. Militants led by the jihadist Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) took over parts of the cities of Falluja and Ramadi in late December. Since then, troops and allied tribesmen have struggled to regain control. The number displaced by the unrest is the highest since the peak of the sectarian insurgency from 2006 to 2008. A further 1.1 million internally displaced people (IDPs) have still not returned to communities in Iraq wracked by violence since 2003. ‘Sustained hardship’ The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said some 50,000 families had fled their homes since clashes […]

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Last updated at 14:00 Anbar Governor Ahmed al-Dulaimi gave the militants until the weekend to surrender Up to 300,000 people have now been displaced by the fighting between Sunni militants and security forces in Iraq’s western province of Anbar, the UN says. Militants led by the jihadist Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) took over parts of the cities of Falluja and Ramadi in late December. Since then, troops and allied tribesmen have struggled to regain control. The number displaced by the unrest is the highest since the peak of the sectarian insurgency from 2006 to 2008. A further 1.1 million internally displaced people (IDPs) have still not returned to communities in Iraq wracked by violence since 2003. ‘Sustained hardship’ The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said some 50,000 families had fled their homes since clashes […]

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If there were such a thing, it would probably be rule No. 1 in the teaching manual for instructors of aspiring suicide bombers: Don’t give lessons with live explosives. In what represented a cautionary tale for terrorist teachers, and a cause of dark humor for ordinary Iraqis, a commander at a secluded terrorist training camp north of Baghdad unwittingly used a belt packed with explosives while conducting a demonstration early Monday for a group of militants, killing himself and 21 other members of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, army and police officials said. Iraqi citizens have long been accustomed to daily attacks on public markets, mosques, funerals and even children’s soccer games, so they saw the story of the fumbling militants as a dark — and delicious — kind of poetic justice, especially coming amid a protracted surge of violence led by the terrorist group, […]

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Iraqi officials say militants have killed 15 troops in an attack overnight on military barracks in a remote area in the country’s north. Police officers said on Tuesday that an unknown number of gunmen attacked the barracks in Ayn al-Jahish village, outside the northern city of Mosul late the previous night. A medical official says eight of the soldiers were beheaded while the others were killed by gunfire. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to media. Mosul is a former insurgent stronghold, located about 360 kilometers (225 miles) northwest of Baghdad. The brazen attack comes amid a surge in violence to levels unseen in Iraq since 2008. It’s been a most serious challenge to the Shiite-led government’s efforts to achieve stability. © 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or […]

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